1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to image viewing and, more particularly, to a method and apparatus for identifying a representative area for an image.
2. Description of the Related Art
Images, such as digital photographs, can be taken in different sizes and in different aspect ratios (such as landscape, portrait, 6×4 inches, 7×5 inches, etc.). In a collection of images, there are often a combination of images with different sizes and aspect ratios mixed together. When displaying thumbnail images of the collection in a grid created by photo organization software tools, display space is wasted or images are cropped to generate uniformly sized thumbnails such as squares. Display space tends to be wasted because the photo organization tools resize irregularly sized images to fit into a pre-allocated grid space with a different aspect ratio than the resized images. Additionally, cropped thumbnail images tend to be “center” cropped, often resulting in an inaccurate representation of the original image.
Therefore, there is a need for a method and apparatus for identifying a representative area for an image.